Anne Green: PR Queen

...Talking with Anne Green (GSAS, '01), President and CEO of CooperKatz.

In
the early 2000's, after approximately a decade
of working in the field of public relations, you entered into the
American Literature PhD program at NYU's Graduate School of Arts and
Science. Now, as a PR
professional with over twenty years of experience, can you talk a little
about
your interest in English and how that education has tied into your
profession?

It’s funny. When I was in graduate
school, I was at the same time still working in public relations and helping Andy
and Ralph build the company [CooperKatz]. This was a start-up, so I’ve been
with them, really, fifteen years, but that was contiguous so there were times
where I was part-time here at the office. But I was really focusing on graduate
school as well. So I had a foot both in the professional world and in academia.

I
think that one thing that was interesting
from my perspective in graduate school and being in that program was the
heavy duty theoretical orientation, the amount of information you’re
trying to
absorb, and trying to learn new things very quickly (say, a new
theorist, a new
work, or a new perspective). I always said that that kind of training
was so
well-suited for the agency and professional services life that I was
also
living in. Because, here, we are a generalist firm; we work across many
industry centers. So I’m working in technology, health care, higher
education—and within a day, I have fifteen or sixteen different subject
matters. And the ability to ramp up that information and to quickly
speak in
that language is what you need to do when you’re in graduate school in
the
humanities. So I always used to tell my friends [at NYU], “hey if anyone
wants
to be in this field, in communications, you would be well-suited for
that.” And
I know a few people who have made that transition. The critical thinking, the
ability to absorb so much information, and to see the connections between
things—there’s so many connections now between industries—that’s what really
what brings value to our clients. Someone who has a broad perspective and
oversight, who can make connections and can give them higher-level counsel.

As a leader in
the field of organizational communications, what personal or professional
qualities do you find most valuable in your role?

Definitely intellectual curiosity—and I say that when I
interview people all the time. We’ve talked about this for a long time, so
everyone here really knows this, but we look for renaissance people. It sounds
funny to say, but the types of people who truly do have interests in many
different kinds of things: can ramp up different types of information, can get
excited about it (that’s the curiosity piece), and can stretch themselves in
various ways. Not everybody is perfectly good at everything. And some people
that work in this field are better suited working with consumer clients than,
say, technology or business-to-business. We want our people to be able to work
in many fields.

We have a lot of people, here, who are coming from a liberal
arts background, and some of them are coming from a bachelor’s where they
studied public relations. But in terms of what we’re looking for
intellectually, it’s still that broad, liberal arts orientation.

According to your LinkedIn profile, you have
worked your way up at CooperKatz from General Manager to COO, and most recently
you’ve assumed the role of Chief Executive Officer. Along the way, how have you
seen the company change, and what have been your proudest accomplishments thus
far?

When I first started with them…I would show up and sit at a
desk in the hallway in our old space, just kind of freelancing, writing bios
for them. So, I really watched and helped the company grow into a real
company—into a company that has won awards for the best agency of the year in
our size category, number eleven in the best agencies to work for in North
America [ranked by The Holmes Report],
beating out a lot of huge firms, with thirty people, close to five-million in
revenue, close to fifteen years-old. To me, that’s building it into a real
company, and I’m really proud of that. And Andy Cooper and Ralph Katz are
incredibly generous about sharing leadership. When they met me, I was right out
of undergrad. For me to grow with them, and to help grow the company, it was
exciting. I never thought I would be helping to run a small business.

Your bio on Twitter states you
as “a singer happily married to a drummer.” What kind of role does music play
in your life? Do you have any other “hobbies” outside of your firm?

Huge, music’s been a huge part of my life. I’ve sung since I
can remember, I’ve always been a singer. In high school I was in the choir, and
in college I was in a cappella, I did classical vocal performances, I did
musicals, and I was always in rock bands. You know, it’s funny. I diverted from
that as a professional life, but to end up having my partner be a musician is
something that is super natural for me. To share my life with someone who is a
working musician—that’s the only thing he’s done his whole life, and that’s the
only thing he would know to do—so he’s the artist, and I’m the corporate one.

Speaking of LinkedIn and Twitter, have you seen social media impact the field of public relations in any way throughout your
career?

Yes, massively. It’s seismic. I think the field of PR is
exactly the same [as the field of social media] in that we have to connect to
the different audiences of our clients in meaningful ways, in authentic ways,
that are relevant to them—and hopefully influence thinking. So digital channels
are completely an organic extension of that, right? So I think that for PR,
since we’ve always been very good at reaching out to different constituencies
with the message that’s right for them, it’s really adaptable to social media. You
have to understand who you’re talking to and why you’re talking to them. You
have to be able to listen to them.

But it’s challenged the field too. There are a lot of folks
in this industry who want to push out the information and want to control it.
So it’s been hard for this industry to understand that we’re not controlling
the message; we need to work with and understand the fact that we’re getting
talked back to—people are talking back to us.

And another challenge is that there are a lot of types of
marketing. There’s advertising, there’s interactive agencies, so there’s a
sense of “who owns social media?” which is a weird, interesting question.

It’s interesting, and I’ll tell you one thing—keeping up
with technology is a full-time job. And, you know, there’s a lot of firms that
have a social media specialist. But I really feel strongly that everyone in our
whole firm has to stay up-to-date with it and we have to educate each other. So
whatever level we’re at, we all really have to stay connected. We all have to
be sharing knowledge.

And the hard thing too is that, you know, no one had any
cognitive dissonance about using an excel spreadsheet to record data, right?
But with Facebook, Twitter, Google +, they’re personal tools too. So it all
kind of gets wound up in how you feel, personally, as a human being, about
using those tools, and how exposed you want to feel. So people sometimes have a
lot more angst about these channels. Everyone has a lot of different feelings
about privacy and about access, so when these things are also business tools,
it gets a lot more messy. And we used to talk in academia about the personal
versus the public, and I really see that now in the business world. So that’s
another way that my academic background informs me.

Back in 1978, the World Assembly of Public Relations Associations defined PR as
“the art and social science of analyzing trends, predicting their consequences,
counseling organizational leaders, and implementing planned programs of action,
which will serve both the organization and the public interest.” In your
opinion, should this definition be amended in any way for 2012?

I have always said that PR is both art and science, and that
media relations is an art—it’s a dance, it’s a two-way street, whatever
metaphor you want to use. I think one of the things you might add to that is
the question of conversation. What discussions are being had and where are they
being held? I mean as an individual, but also society as a whole. What are
people talking about and how are they understanding things? That is probably
the thing that’s missing. But the counseling, and the looking at trends, and
the planning and being strategic…and I do think that serving both the
organization and the public interest is important. There are people with many
different perspectives on what PR is. Some of them are informed by pop-culture,
like Sex and the City’s Samantha Jones, right? And a lot of people have a sense
that it’s just about spin or control. I think, though, that if you actually
survey the industry, it’s a highly ethical industry, and very focused on
transparency.

According to
PRNewser, Penn State’s Board of Trustees has hired Ketchum to handle their
crisis communications. What is your opinion of this situation from a PR
perspective?

It’s a very difficult
situation, and it’s really hard to play backseat driver on this one. I think
that everyone agrees that, coming right out of the gate, they were not in a
very good place in how they reacted to it. They needed to have more thoughtful
counsel right from the beginning. They made some very serious missteps,
including the former president’s comments the next day of full support for the
two individuals who had then resigned. When I heard that statement, I couldn’t
believe it—I mean how could you possibly come out and say you fully support
them when you don’t know the facts? But Ketchum is an excellent firm. I think
with this there’s legal implications, there’s law enforcement. They have to
keep people informed at appropriate times, but they have to be respectful to
the legal process too. It’s very difficult to comment on that one, and I
understand why you asked. They have a lot of healing to do, and I think Ketchum
will be very focused on how they interact with their community.

Is there anything else you’d
like to add?

You know, I think what’s interesting,
and what I was reflecting on before, is that the humanities PhD context is
challenging because of the diminishing amount of tenure track positions. And
it’s so funny, I just saw an article online by a history professor at a college
in California titled, “No You will not be a Tenure Track History Professor.” There
are a lot of messages of doom and gloom regarding that, and I understand
why—there’s a sense of realism. But one thing that I would really encourage is
that, that kind of studying in an advanced degree in the humanities, whether
one does a whole PhD, or whether they do what I did—which is say,” hey you know
what, I’m going to take another turn here and re-focus on my other career.” I
really do think that that kind of thinking can set you up in so many different
directions. It’s good for students to be open to that. There are a lot of
different pathways you can take. I would never regret that experience—it was
such a fantastic time, and I was able to do it in a way that worked for me.